A gunman opened fire in a Newtown elementary school Friday morning, killing 20 young children and six others before taking his own life in one of the deadliest mass shootings in history.

Another adult, identified by law enforcement sources as the gunman's mother, was found dead in a nearby home. Including the shooter, the death toll was 28 -- by far the highest ever in Connecticut.

The massacre rocked the small western Connecticut town, generated waves of sympathy from across the world and brought President Barack Obama to tears at an afternoon press briefing.

The shooting took place just after 9:30 a.m. at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, authorities said. The gunman, identified by sources as 20-year-old Adam Lanza, was found dead inside the school shortly after the shooting.

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Lanza's mother, Nancy Lanza, was presumed dead. Ryan Lanza, the shooter's 24-year-old brother, was being questioned by federal authorities at his apartment in Hoboken, N.J., after a wave of confusion in which multiple media outlets mistakenly identified Ryan Lanza as the shooter.

The gunman drove to the school in his mother's car, a law enforcement official said. Three guns were found -- a Glock and a Sig Sauer, both pistols, inside the school, and a .223-caliber rifle in the back of a car.

Police told youngsters at the kindergarten-through-fourth-grade school to close their eyes as they were led from the building so that they wouldn't see the blood and broken glass.

Schoolchildren -- some crying, others looking frightened -- were escorted through a parking lot in a line, hands on each other's shoulders.

A custodian ran through the halls, warning of a gunman on the loose, and someone switched on the intercom, alerting people in the building to the attack -- and perhaps saving many lives -- by letting them hear the hysteria going on in the school office, a teacher said. Teachers locked their doors and ordered children to huddle in a corner or hide in closets as shots echoed through the building.

Authorities gave no details on exactly how the attack unfolded, but police radio traffic indicated the shooting lasted only a few minutes. State police Lt. Paul Vance said officers arrived instantaneously, immediately entered the school, searched it completely and found Lanza dead.

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy, who was mayor of Stamford during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks when nine of the city's residents were killed, said he never imagined he would encounter such tragedy again in his career as a public official. The governor called Friday's shooting an "unspeakable and tragic event."

"Evil visited this community today," Malloy said. "It's too early to speak of recovery, but each parent, each sibling, each member of the family has to understand that Connecticut, we're all in this together. We'll do everything we can to overcome this event."

State police, who were coordinating the investigation with local and federal officials, declined to confirm any of the victims' identities.

Friends and relatives identified two of those killed as Sandy Hook Elementary Principal Dawn Hochsprung and school psychologist Mary Sherlach. None of the children were identified.

Vance said state police would hold a news conference at 8 a.m. today.

The massacre threw families of children at the school into a nightmarish morning in which some parents were unsure whether their children were safe.

Stephen Delgiadice said his 8-year-old daughter heard two big bangs and teachers told her to go into a corner. His daughter was fine, he said.

"It's alarming, especially in Newtown, Connecticut, which we always thought was the safest place in America," he said.

Sarah Walker Caron, a former New Haven Register reporter, said her young son, Will, was in the school at the time of the shooting.

"I've never been more terrified in my life," she said. "My heart was pounding. I couldn't race fast enough (to the school)."

Mergim Bajraliu, a 17-year-old student at Newtown High School, has a 9-year-old sister who's a fourth-grade student at the school.

The Bajraliu family lives nearby, and Mergim Bajraliu said he heard the shots because he had stayed home from school. He and his mother went to the school to get his sister before most of the responders arrived.

"My first was thought was, 'Oh my God,'" he said. "You start to put the pieces together. You would never think this would happen in an area like this."

He saw a police officer carrying out a little girl whose body was limp.

"The cop was just carrying her and she was leaning back," he said. "It was very traumatizing."

Many parents walked down street holding hands with their children.

"I heard what happened on the news, and I just headed here to get my son," said a mother, Maria Nascimento.

Audra Barth, another mother who has two children at the school, said initially that parents were given no information.

"I was just at home going crazy," she said. "I didn't even know which school it was. I found out from media."

Luie Munguia, 8, a third-grader at the school, said she was under a desk with three or four people after hearing the gunshots. He said he didn't see anyone who got hurt.

He was walking with his mom, Lindsay Sweeney, and grandmother, Kathy Sweeney

"It is surreal, like something out of a movie," Lindsay Sweeney said. "I heard a child didn't make it. I'm just praying for everyone."

Richard Wilford, 36, of Sandy Hook, said he and his wife were home when they got the call that there was a shooting at their son's school.

Their son, Richie, 7, said the gun shots sounded like "really loud pots were banging."

"It's the most terrible moment of a parent's life -- you have no idea," Richard Wilford said.

The death toll was more than triple that of any other shooting in the state's history. An employee at a Manchester beer distribution center killed eight coworkers before committing suicide in 2010.

Four people were killed in a 1998 shooting at the state lottery headquarters in Rocky Hill, and six were killed in a 1978 robbery at a New Britain bakery.

The only shooting spree in U.S. history that was deadlier was a 2007 massacre at Virginia Tech in which a gunman killed 32 people before killing himself.

A tearful Obama struggled to maintain his composure while comforting the nation after the second mass shooting in less than six months. On July 20, a gunman killed 12 people and injured 58 at a movie theatre in Aurora, Colo.